Ukrainian mother, child killed in Gaza

(JTA) — Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip killed a Ukrainian woman and her child, the first foreign nationals killed in the war.

Israeli forces launched 30 attacks on Gaza on Friday, media reports said. Tank shells killed a family of seven, including an infant, Palestinian authorities said. Another attack killed three men, including two Hamas terrorists.

A Ukrainian woman and her 1-year-old child were killed Thursday by an Israeli tank shell; the woman was married to a Palestinian doctor. Early in the war Israel opened Gaza’s borders to allow out foreign nationals. The surgeon told the New York Times he had begged his wife to leave, but she refused.

Israel says it has been targeting areas where Hamas terrorists take cover among civilians to launch rocket attacks.

Palestinians launched 30 rockets into Israel on Friday, Israeli radio reported, reaching areas as far north as Ashkelon and as far west as Beersheba.

Separately, Gaza’s health ministry has reported that a third of some 750 Palestinians killed in fighting since Dec. 27 have been children.

Israel launched major operations that day, two weeks after the Hamas terrorists who control the Gaza Strip drastically intensified rocket attacks on Israel’s south. Four Israeli civilians and ten Israeli soldiers have died in the fighting.